-
It started wonderful but ended up me having my first-time anxiety attack..
Warning: Long post 😅 It’s been a waaay long time for me to post this. I actually started to write this last Monday but finished it now. Sorry that it took time!
●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●
It started wonderful and fun but ended up with tears and a first-time anxiety attack.
Hello my darlings, my pumpkins! I apologize so much that I havent blogged the whole weekend but I have (as you read here) been visiting my friend for her birthday.
But here the pictures and adventures of the weekend come.
●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●
Thursday ;
so many transportation and so much stress. Confused and walked around like a chicken. I came to conclusion that, finding the right subway and train in Stockholm is harder than finding transportation and directions in Italy. Even though I don’t know Italian.
Arrived in Norrtälje in time and waited on my friend Michaela at the bus station. Standing there, with pink-red hair, my demon vest, and all in black, with headphones on, I danced around to Psy—Gangnam Style. Yes, I still listen to that song.
Went home to Michaela, dumped my stuff and we went out to the town. Super cute!

We went to a few stores and just walked around. Michaela showed me around. I took some photos with my phone .






I found some cute stuff, like the wall and flower shelf.
After that, we met up with P and had lunch (note that I hadn’teaten the whole day), and we went to a place called Ed’s Burgers, which was delicious. Homemade burgers and their chili mayonnaise… oh my god. I could drink it! They weren’t shy about giving fries, that’s for sure!

●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●
Friday
The day started with just walking around, grocery store and just relax. We went to a shopping area and the joy i had on my face when they had one of my favorite stores! I bought some makeup there because I didn’t have with me. Eyeshadows, Highlighter, eyeliner etc. Some candy and drinks to drink while being there. After we went to an other store – Dollarstore where I bought my absolute favorite eyeshadow palette and eyeliner!
Went to Lidl and bought a 2L sprite zero to take with us back to her home. While crossing the road when the light were green, a freaking bus came so we had to rush back up on the sidewalk. He almost drove over us! Even when the light was green for us.
The shock and adrenaline that kicked in on me was insane! Michaela got mad directly! Before all this happened we said “luckily no one of us is suicidal anymore” and this happened. Oh god.
Back home we started to get ready. The time was around 4pm and Michaela had made a reservation at a restaurant for us two and her friends. Makeup, fashion, hair fixed, bag packing and off we went.
Note that it was first time in a while I wore makeup so I automatically felt a little pretty which was so good.

In my bag i had packed down my powerbank, bottles of Pepsi Max, perfume etc. Typical stuff for me.
After that we went to the restaurant and a friend was sitting there already. She was early so we sat down with her and after a few minutes another friend of Michaela came.
We started to order food and Michaela and P ordered alcohol while me and E drank Coca Cola Zero.
The food arrived and I said everyone to wait “PICTURES TO MY BLOG!” and I took them (E and Michaelas food pictures didnt turn out good so I skip sharing them).




Honest review of my food ; I had the meat and potato gratin (3rd picture) with Aioli. It was delicious! I didnt eat the tomato though but the salad we got separately, after I removed the cucumber. 8/10 I would rate the food.
After the restaurant we went to a pub and just had fun. So much laughter, alcohol coming (Pepsi Max for me) and karaoke. I actually tried a few (3) sips from P’s beer. Fun fact; I like the taste of beer but dislike alcohol.
Michaela did karaoke with the song “Durch den Monsun” by Tokio Hotel (our favorite band) but I saw she struggled (for the first time) so I went up to her EVEN after I have been saying “Over my dead body you are getting me up and sing karaoke” yet I did and we sang the song together. I sang and we had fun.

Luckily I didnt have a microphone. I refused it but we stood there and sang. Afterwards we went back to the table and the laughing continued.
a random dude had been trying for a long time to try get anyone of us to dance with him. He was super drunk so we refused.
Instead me and P took pictures together (new friendship has been made since thursday) and I had to guide her to bathroom etc (shes almost blind), we spoke about random stuff, laughed and had fun.
Im not sure if she gives me permission to be shown in the blog so I have covered her eyes etc.


After many hours of laughter, alcohol, me chugging Pepsi max (due to me had tried 3 sips of alcohol) we all went home. We were home at 3am. That is insanely late for me but hey, I had fun!


Yes I used a filter to make my makeup show better on the one where I drink beer and to make my nose smaller (I hate my nose) thats why the glas is curvy.
●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●
Saturday
We went out to the town again. Michaela needed to go pick up a jewelry she had at a store where she had engraved names. Afterwards we walked around, went to stores and she showed me an 113 years old café! C R A Z Y!







They had a kitchen from the very beginning of the start of the café. I love seeing old stuff like that. Thinking of everything that could have happened, the baking, cooking etc. My mind went crazy! Wonder what they actually made on it.
after that we went out for a walk, looking around and me having my phone is my hand, taking a lot of pictures – almost so I think Michaela got annoyed of me 😂







The first picture of the fish—oh my god, how insanely full the river was! I have never seen so many, and unfortunately the picture doesn’t do it justice.
3pm it was time! Michaela had brought tickets to go to Finland! CRAZY! The ride was only four hours but still!! Sadly stuff happened so I didn’t enjoy the trip. I cried pretty much the whole ride (why im not getting into) so I mostly sat and played games while struggling to not let Michaela and L (a new friend) see my tears.
I saw a pretty sunset so ofcourse I took pictures, but after it became more beautiful, I just ignored it. My head and tears was out of control.
I regret it today but hopefully another chance will come so I can see it.

More pictures from the boat comes below and I’m happy that I took all these. Some happiness in sadness. All I thought when I saw the sunset was my mother, she loves sunsets and especially when the sky is pink. I could hear her voice in my head saying “Look Emma, look how gorgeous the sunset and sky is”. It made me happy. Yes my mother has passed away.














Have I told you all how much I love the sea? I could live on it.
Saturday Night
After we came back to the town, we all went out to the pub. Which is where I had my very first in-life experience of an anxiety attack . It was scary. Why I had it, I won’t tell. But everyone i hung out with knows the reason.
We also went to another pub which in my opinion was cute. A Hard Rock style ish pub. My style you know. Me and Michaela went there earlier on the day because she wanted to show me it. All I could say was “Aw its super cute”. No drinking there tho at that time of the day.




After a while we started to walk back home to Michaela, and she showed me the town at nighttime, and I wrote some interesting messages on the water (after the low temperature at night and heat of the day) at the bus stop, some very interesting messages.



●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●
Sunday
Time to go home. I packed all my stuff, and we took off to Stockholm, where we went, the more confused we got to find the right platform.
We ended up at a food place and ordered some burgers (I had chicken burger) and sat there for a bit. I got stressed though. Thinking I would miss the train, even though I had two hours before it ledt.



after the food, we went out so I could take pictures (for the blog ofcourse) and on the same time have a 🚬 (yes I smoke) and all off the sudden two girls came up and asked for one. Me looking at them and I said straight out “No. You are minors” and they walked away.
After that we left pretty fast (I didnt want to get asked by more minors – they are sneaky by asking several people at the time) and walked to the trainstation – which took of plenty of time to find the correct platform.


We sat here for around 1 hour. Just talked about the weekend, how it went etc. I tried to sneak up on pigeons to take pictures up close but no. Ofcourse they ran off.
The tears fell down my cheeks while I was on the train back home. Back home I met up with a friend who held me company for 30 minutes before the bus came. I had told her all about the weekend, so we spoke about that, and of course, I started to cry.
At home, I dumped all my stuff and went straight to bed. I had no energy to stay up. Migraine had kicked in hours earlier due to all crying.
More photos I took in Norrtälje




















Highlight and.. not so highlights
Highlight; Finally met my friend after five months of chatting and video ● Dinner at a cute restaurant with two other people where bonds were connected ● went to pubs for the first time of my life ● sang karaoke ● danced with the dude (I write about it below) ● sunsets
Not highlights; all the tears ● the migraines ● boat (it was no fun for me) and probably more which you have probably read above. Haha! My head is empty now.
About the dancing with a dude: Remember the dude who had been nagging us, trying to get any of us to dance with him on the Friday night? Well, on Saturday I did. I danced with him, but he was horrible at dancing, so I ended up going back to the table, and we laughed. He sat down at the table next to us.
Yeah, so this was pretty much the weekend. We had been doing more stuff as well, but nothing exciting, lol!
●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●○●
I apologize as well for wrong spelling and weird grammar. I’m writing this on the phone, and the text plus photos in this post make the writing process super slow.
-
The stress this morning is ridiculous, but I’m finally…
The day is here and im currently on my fourth sort of transportation. The stress is real and I can honestly say It’s easier to find where to go in Italy than in Stockholm, Sweden.

The alarm went off at 6am as usual. I packed pretty much all my stuff yesterday but had to add some stuff before I left for the bus to go to the train station.
The stress this whole morning/fornoon was insane but now im on my last transportation til the end destination for the weekend.

Bus, train , subway and bus. All this since 8.12am til noon. Insane.
And being a Swedish person going to the capital of Sweden and getting lost everywhere is kind of embarrassing. Even if I asked three different staff for directions to find the correct platforms, etc., I still managed to get lost. It was horribly bad with signs of where the platforms, etc., were.
It’s so bad that I think it’s easier to find in Italy. The bus, the trolley, street navigation, etc. Compared to here. That’s crazy 😅

I just wanted to pop in here and say good morning and tell you how my morning has been. I’m going to try to get some rest because I’m dead tired, and I need to save battery on my phone. I only have 8% and I’m at my end destination in 30 minutes. 🥴
I’ll blog more later. Tell you all about today’s adventure etc
-
You Asked, I’m Here: A New Introduction
I have new followers and new readers – HI, HELLO AND WELCOME! I hope you enjoy my little corner here on the internet.
I thought I should do a new small introduction of myself. Maybe you wanna tell me a little bit about yourself? Would love to know 🤗🩷
I’m excited to share a fresh introduction about myself. I’m someone who enjoys embracing new experiences and learning every day. I find joy in growth and discovery.
This new chapter is all about being authentic, open, and ready to make meaningful connections.

(I dont have other pictures right now so I use these for now)
Me, myself and my life
Hello! My name is Emma and my blog is called Emma Santorini. Santorini is not my real last name but I took it into my name here on the blog due to Santorini, Greece has been a dream location of mine to visit and I just love the name “Santorini”. anyway lets continue…
I am a woman born 1990 (woop sweet 90s!) and I am from and live in Sweden. I am overweight due to a diagnosis I have called PCOS. I have weight almost 200kg but have struggled and fought to lose a lot of weight. My journey is not over yet. You will also be able to follow my weightloss journey here in the blog.
I’m also a mother to a sweet little man (born 2017) who has autism level 3 and is non verbal.
I am nurse assistant but I am currently studying (swedish;) Barnskötare med specialisering funktionsnedsättning (caretaker for children with specializing npf sorta explanation). Which means I will be able to help/teach/ be assistant to children or adults with special needs in school etc. My goal is to become a preschool teacher and work with special need kids (autism, down syndrome etc).
My intrests is (except my family) is beauty, photography, learning new things, music and laugh.
I dislike; horses (scary for me), clowns, bridges, small spaces and deep oceans (even though i love ocean/the sea)
I like; Pepsi max, photo, travel, metal music, write lyrics, chill, hang out with friends, doing makeup and alot more.
My style, personality and the whole shebang
My style is kinda odd. Normally I have neon red hair with a lot of makeup. My fashion style is a little bit mix of goth and alternative. Meaning, everything i wear is black and has attitude. Lol!
What is the blog about?
My blog is a lifestyle blogger with a mix of photography, mental health, daily life, travel and family.
I will also write about topics I think is important to talk about such as mental health, depression, bullying etc.
I want to help people, connect with everyone no matter if you have a blog or not. Special niches, intrests etc. I love connecting with people.
Photographer
I am a hobby / amateur photographer. My thing in photography is landscape, travel, macro, windows and details. Yes you read right.. windows. I discovered that winter 2024 and I had to look up the law in Sweden when it comes to that > read my post about the terrifying interaction I had and why I looked up the laws < taking pictures of people’s windows.
I also take photos of food. Yes you read that right as well. If I try something new, or hanging out with my friends etc. Always snapping pictures of the food so be prepared for food pictures as well.








I upload a lot of pictures in my blog. Both pictures from my cameras Canon 450D (my companion in crime) and Canon R10 but also with my phone (depends which one i have) thats currently Samsung s23 Ultra.
I edit my pictures on my phone (yes my laptop is too weak to handle photo editing program) and they always look sharp but unfortunately in the blog…a whole different story.
Education (Nurse Assistant)
I studied to become a nurse assistant back in August 2022 to December 2023. January 2024 I started to study my grades up and have been doing that since that time. In August 2025 I’m gonna start study Barnskötare med specialisering funktionsnedsättning (swedish) and I have mixed feelings.
Nurse assistant education was actually a promise I made with my mom before she passed. It was her dream for to become a N.A. I love helping people and elderly people. Being there when they need help, their extended arm when needed etc. But after been working at the hospital, different senior homes (this was also before I had my education that I worked on S.H) and what I saw plus experience among the workers… it made me quit fast. I couldn’t stand for how they worked and everything.
Complains to the boss and the city halls about how it was didnt help so I quit.

Picture of me when I worked at a senior home.

when i worked at the hospital and lost -40kg on 3 months. How? I walked 250km per day (not in one walk. several walks per day) Worth knowing about me and the blog
I am self-taught on the language english. I know my grammar and some spelling will be off and wrong. I apologize for that now and in advance.
I have ADHD so my posts can sometimes be all over.
I struggle with bad mental health that iam working on to get out. I have been in dark places but I am in much better place now and it gives me motivation to continue.
My blog is raw (I am honest about things and stuff) and will not hide stuff. The blog is like my diary. Where I can write my thoughts feelings- mourn the loss of my parents- personal struggles- positivity to everyone and what happen in my life.
Everything is not always positive and sometimes I will be off from the blog and that will due to the fact that it is a lot going on in my head. But I will try to stay active.
As a small part of a family blogger I will also share posts about my son- what he has done, school, activities, etc
Future plans
I have a lot of future plans, both when it comes to my life but also with the blog.
I will travel and is actually currently planning of going to either Santorini or Mykonos in Greece or Milan in Italy. I haven’t decided yet. I want to “finish” one country at the time but also explore other places.
I want be able to inspire people somehow.
I want to expand my knowledge of things like in photography, languages etc
(ridiculous plan now) I want to be published as a photographer with my picture somewhere. That would be so amazing!
BECOME MYSELF! Yes my absolute future plans im gonna work hard on is to become myself again. Happy, bubbly, laughing Emma. and ofcourse have my neon red hair again.
I guess that summons most of it about me and this introduction.
Remember to follow me and my blog. You can click subscribe at the bottom right (on phone) or you can subscribe with your email adress (I wont be able to see that one so dont worry).
-
How is it even possible…???
Hello my loves! iam currently in the bath writing this post. As you all know, I went back home to Sweden last Saturday (26th) and yesterday (sunday) was a huge struggle for me.

I was awake the entire time! I didnt sleep at all that night, or on the plane nor the train. I didnt go to sleep until 11pm so i dont know how many hours that I was awake (and im honestly to tired to count right now).
I really tried to get some sleep on the plane and train but no. I couldn’t. not even for a second.

breakfast/lunch/the day before dinner Saturday ; it was one stressful morning / day. I didnt sleep anything at all. Everything was closed at the airport when I arrived there so I had to wait to be able to buy something to eat. Luckily I had ice tea with me that I drank until a coffee shop opened.
The sandwich was very.. interesting. I dont know what kind of ham they have in Italy but its way different than what im used to.
Sandwhich; edamer cheese, some lettuce and some ham. Heated up. ●●●● 2 of 5.
Fruit cup; mix of apple, pineapples, melon and peach. ●●●● 3 of 5. I couldn’t eat the apples due to problems and the reason why so low in points was because to tasted like its been out in the sun for hours.
Ice tea – Peach; When it comes to ice tea iam very very picky so I was actually surprised that I found an ice tea from a convenience store next to my hotel where I stayed at, that I really liked. Not so sweet and not so bitter. Perfect combination. ●●●● 4 of 5. The flavors was smashing but there’s something I cant put finger on that I was missing. I recommend this tea tho! (I will see if I find a picture later of it)







At the airport in Stockholm, Sweden I got really mad because my luggage was delayed and actually lost but later was found. Fortunately I got it in time so I could take the train I had tickets to instead of buying new ones. The amount of stress and to find the right platform of right side of the airport for the right train etc was .. wow. but luckily I managed JUST IN TIME to find it.

While waiting those few minutes I had to spare before the train came i noticed that the suitcase of mine was damaged! It is the second time I use this suitcase! I have never in my life ever thought that it was true with what I have seen.. that the airport damage someones property/ belongings and now I have seen it myself! I was (still are) beyond me. Mad? Yes! Upset? Ofcourse! Kinda make myself feel dumb? Oh yes! Like never in my wildest dreams I ever thought this would actually happen!

with 3% battery left on my phone i made a quick call to notify M about the suitcase. After several pictures taken later, I finally stepped on the train. Smacked the suitcase behind me and just sat down. Tried to get a little bit of sleep but during the train home I felt how my bloossugar was declining and going down so I rushed to grab the fruit cup I remembered I had.
On the train I edited some photos I took and tried this black and white contrast thing. I dont know what I feel / if I like them but here is some I show you before I talk about yesterday (Sunday)




Click on picture to see them full size.


Sunday; with the big S.. sleeping.. I was so tired yesterday. I fell asleep three times within a few hours. It was like someone had smacked my head several times with something big and heavy. I couldn’t keep my eyes open. So after E went to sleep I finally went to bed.. 20.15pm ish or so.
I didnt have any energy. It’s like all those sleepless nights I had in Venice due to migraine and heat just came crashing down on me and yeah. Today iam feeling a bit better. Still super tired but a bit better. Back to reality life. Routines is finally starting again with E and his school. Night schedules are changed back and now comes the hard part… to get myself up and stay awake during the days.
Two weeks / 14 days left til I go back to school and become a student. .. AGAIN! But this time im actually taking a big step in right directions to become the preschool teacher for special need childen. I can’t wait! I’m excited but on same time im terrified because its at the same school as I did my nurse education and I hate that school.
im gonna fix more pictures and add them here in the blog. I will also share some on my instagram; thecaffeinatedraccoon yes it is really my username on Instagram. I had to change due to the stalker in my former school and havent changed back since. I might do that one day.
-
Sweden Golden Gate Bridge
So the other day we went to the Golden Gate Bridge of Sweden. A beautiful location in my opinion but my man didn’t find it so fun.

it might be as “flashy” as the GGB but atleast its similar to it.
The drive was just about two hours which is okey. We were bored at home so I came up with the idea to go here because M has never seen it before and I wanted to share a moment with E.

one thing iam kinda “disappointed ” about this location is the view of the surroundings. Lol. I know i know “Emma, they can’t control the nature”.
Sadly I couldn’t take photos from different angles or from different point of view.
●● Now I have a countdown and alot to do! Iam going to Italy – ALONE! Scary! Iam very excited but also kinda nervous and scared. I will take a lot of photos ofcourse and I will blog if I find internet to keep you guys updated and come along with me on this trip! Woho!
